


Dysfunctional Love Songs

by Coriander_Dreams



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, Canon Character of Color, Canon Mentally Ill Character, Character Study, Control, Dom/sub, F/F, Mentions of canon character death, Painplay, Relationship Negotiation, Risk Aware Consensual Kink, actually there's a few of those, and this whole thing is just deeply fatalistic, but that doesn't mean it's not poorly thought out, improper communication of feelings, probably some season 3 spoilers, radically demiromantic character, that's a pun, the Whole Nine Yards
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-09
Updated: 2016-08-07
Packaged: 2018-04-30 17:51:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 17,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5173526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coriander_Dreams/pseuds/Coriander_Dreams
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She'll have that steak and she'll eat it with her hands, if she damn well wants, and she'll buy Bear presents and generally she do what she likes. What feels good. Because it's not like she really expects to live long enough to worry about consequences anyway.<br/>She's okay with that.</p><p>Shaw makes some very bad choices that turn out, in the end, to be pretty good ones. </p><p>Not consistent with season 3 finale bc I have this weird habit of not watching finales until the next season comes out (on netflix, in this case)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. You'll Be Back

**Author's Note:**

> So: What is going on with this fic? I'm not really sure, to be honest, but I was toying with the idea of trying to write these two in a relationship that's both in character and healthy, which is a bit of a challenge, and I kind of ended up making a playlist.  
> And then that playlist turned into a story.  
> I've only written about half of it all the way out, so far, so I'm not sure if I'm going to be successful about the in character/healthy thing, but here goes anyway.  
> The title of each chapter is the title of the song, and the italics that subdivide it are lyrics from it. Let me know if you'd like more info on the music or a link to the playlist, either here or on my tumblr (the link to which is in my bio). The nature of this whole "a-song-a-chapter" thing has resulted in really uneven chapter lengths, just a heads up.  
> As always, I relish your feedback.  
> And hopefully this will update on Sundays and Thursdays.

_You'll remember you belong to me_

            Shaw is under no delusions: She knows Control will kill her without a second thought. She trusts them, yes, she trusts them to give her the numbers. And she trusts that the numbers will be legitimate targets for homeland security. But honestly, she doesn't really care. Doesn't care if they aren't, doesn't care much who she's killing as long as she's not breaking laws doing it. Or, she probably is. So long as a strange shadow-government is protecting her from persecution, then. This is what makes her a good agent. This is what makes all their agents good agents, when it gets right down to it, and she knows the vast majority of her peers would have as little trouble killing her as she would have killing them. That's why most of them never got far before Control came along and picked them up, before their inability to be disquieted by mortality got labeled a "skill" instead of a threat or an illness.

 

_And when push comes to shove, I will send a fully armed battalion to remind you of my love!_

            When she leaves Control, she is unsurprised to find herself pursued to within an inch of her life. They can't get her though, because she's better than the rest of them at this game. She always has been. She used to think not caring is what made her better but she's coming to realize that's not it at all. Not that she cares more now than she did, but she's noticing she must've cared all along. After all, it's not like she particularly craves killing people, nor like she got started by accident. A man in a suit came to meet her, and told her that he knew she was going to make an awful doctor, but that he thought she'd be excellent at keeping her country to safe. And so she said yes, because...she wanted to protect....something. She still isn't sure what. But the point is she got into this mess in the first place because she cared: maybe about herself or maybe an ideal of some nature or horrifyingly enough maybe even about _people_. Anyway, taking out their agents is getting a little tiring--even though after her little stint with death that apparently was very convincing right up until the point she and Reese wound up trailing an innocent mark straight into the dens of well, terrorists, they've been sending only their subtlest after her. To surveil, yes, but she knows damn good and well when she's being cased, so she tries to make a game of it. See how many false leads she can give them before they get themselves killed. She doesn't even have to do the killing herself anymore, they way they play this game. She's not sure if she's disappointed or relieved. Which, to be honest, is probably the summary of her entire goddamn life.

 

_You'll be the one complaining when I am gone_

            Fine. She admits it. She misses the numbers. Misses being given a purpose, because it's clear she's not just going to come up with one on her own. This, more than anything else, is why she finally takes Finch and Reese up on their offer. Well, the purpose thing and Bear. That dog is a treasure.

 

_cuz when push comes to shove, I will kill your friends and family to remind you of my love!_

            When she learns that Control has been disbanded, even though the circumstances around that particular event could spell ruin for their rag-tag group of heroes, she feels...It takes her awhile to figure it out, but she's been thinking about what Gen said. About her having feelings with volume turned down low, and so sometimes....sometimes she's been trying to listen harder. And she realizes she feels relieved. Because she knows she cares, in her own way, about Finch and Reese and Bear and maybe even Fusco.  Not a lot. Not like she'd _cry_ if anything happened to them just like...maybe she'd go on a revenge spree. Something like that. Because they're her _team_ , and being a team means she trusts them and her life revolves around them, in a way, and she can't imagine how weird her daily routine would be without them around. She knows that Control is obviously not above killing people she likes to make a point. And she'd rather they not get killed.


	2. Vices and Virtues

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is still very Shaw-focused: I promise Root will show up in the next chapter. In general I'll be writing this very much from Shaw's perspective, if that hasn't been abundantly clear :)  
> And the song this chapter is by the Dropkick Murphys. Last chapter's was from the musical Hamilton, in case you somehow haven't been completely inundated by that wonderful creation of Lin-Manuel Miranda's.

_another died by a bullet at the hand of a sniper's gun_

            Of course, as she once more finds herself shot at by Vigilance, she thinks not for the first time that it's not like they have a particularly long life-expectancy anyway. She's heard Reese and Finch talk about how if they keep doing this they'll probably both wind up dead. They're right. And she'll probably wind up dead too. And Fusco. And Root. Probably even Zoe. Hell, Carter already left her son without a mother. So in any case, they're all a little doomed. A little fatalistic. And in some way or another they'd all given up on living very long before this venture started. 

_for a war we never won_

Which is probably why it's okay that they have no end-goal. There is no such thing as 'victory', no time when they can hang up the guns and shut off the computers. Theirs is a perpetual mission, and they may win for a little while, but in the end the numbers will keep coming. It's not like they're doing anything to prevent people from attempting violent crime. It's not there's anything they could do anyway. In the end, they will lose. They all know it. They're just trying to tip the ratio a bit, trying to save as many people (like Gen) as they can before the scales dip too far out of their favor. Until Gen, actually, Shaw didn't much care if they won or lost. She was never big on the moral conundrum of saving the few vs the many: To her, the many won every time. It was only logical. So it's strange to be working in the interest of the few. And it's strange that she finds it _worth it_ , now, to save people like Gen and Grace and even the former Olympic athlete turned forced jewel thief. It's not like she didn't use to think there were good people in the world. She used to think that it didn't much matter. Now, maybe it does. Maybe...God, it's so sappy, but maybe Gen will grow up to make a big difference. Because of her.

 

_whiskey war suicide and guns_

            Anyway, with the possible exception of Bear, they're all slowly dying. Well, everyone is slowly dying. That's pretty much a synonym for life. They're dying at a rather expedited rate. So in this world where it's a reasonably fair bet that someone will point a gun at her by the end of the day, she'll have that extra shot of whiskey. And she'll steal it from Finch, and his collection of the good stuff. She'll have that steak and she'll eat it with her hands, if she damn well wants, and she'll buy Bear presents and generally she do what she likes. What feels good. Because it's not like she really expects to live long enough to worry about consequences anyway.

She's okay with that.

_they'll be no heroes welcome_

Despite her quips about their comic-book like vigilantism, she knows they're no heroes. Well. Not Marvel-style anyway. Maybe they could get picked up by DC and its tendency to write antiheroes, but even then their pasts would stand out (And yes, she's a nerd. Shut up). They weren't _reckless_ , in their past lives, they were....straight-up morally dubious. Finch basically invented big brother and coded it to ignore individual lives. She and Reese were government-sanctioned killers who didn't ask questions. Fusco was right up there with the dirtiest of dirty cops. Zoe literally makes her living by blackmailing people. And Root is more than a little unhinged, has been a contract killer and a hacker and a torturer and anything in between both for her own purposes and to the highest bidder. They aren't heroes. They aren't good people. Despite Finch and Reese's idea of this as a form of redemption, she knows good and well that none of them can make up for what they were. Or what they are. And really, she doesn't care. She has never, particularly, desired to be a good person. It's never bothered her when she's fallen short of that metric.

Carter was a good person. Maybe the only good person they've worked with.

Carter's dead.


	3. Die Young

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All right! Time for things to get exciting. The version of this song I listened to whilst writing this was the Postmodern Jukebox cover, which is really astonishingly addictive and I highly recommend.   
> Oh, and I did my best to on researching recovery for the particular kind of bullet wound that is actually not all that critical a part of this chapter: Mostly I got a lot of individual variability. So I'm 100% making that shit up, for the record.

  _let's make the most of tonight like we're gonna die young_

After Harold takes Root on as his new project, they start to work together pretty regularly. If Shaw's being completely honest with herself they've always made a good team, even when they weren't a team she was on completely of her own free will. There is something beautifully satisfying about watching Root stride into danger completely confident, gun in each hand, dispatching their enemies without even turning her head to look. It seems supernatural, and even though Shaw knows she's got an all-seeing AI in her ear telling her where and when to shoot, the awe persists.

            Root's taken a liking to her. Well. Root took a liking to her when they met, when she tased her, tied her to a chair, and threatened her with an iron. But now that liking is a little less intrigue and a lot more fondness. Root has always, it seems, been fond of certain people: her friend growing up, Harold, and now Shaw. She smiles when she sees her, calls her 'sweetie', refers to her by name while she continues to call Reese creative derivations of his relationship to Harold. Shaw has nothing in particular against Reese, but she finds herself smiling at these descriptions anyway. They're pretty accurate.

            Anyway, she trusts Root. If Root puts her hand on her arm, she'll pause before jumping into the fray, wait until Root tells her what to do. After all, she's got the most comprehensive intel the world has ever seen feeding directly into her brain. One night they're at some fancy gala or another tailing a number. Shaw hates these fucking things, can't believe how often she has to forego her preferred black hoodie, t-shirt and jeans for some tight shiny cocktail dress or another. But it's the job, so she rolls her eyes and finds increasingly creative places to hide her weaponry.

            She's surveying the room from the corner with the drinks, sipping champagne and watching their number as he flirts with one of the event organizers. She's close enough to hear him, if just barely, and she can't help but wonder if someone put a hit out on him in order to force him to get some new lines. He is, in her estimation, wholly unappealing. But he's rich, he's got that going for him. Maybe someone will try to seduce him for his money. That'd be interesting. Anyway, she's watching him so when Root rests a hand on her shoulder she has to force herself not to startle. She's a professional....what's the opposite of assassin? Freelance lifesaver? In any case she does not startle.

            "Do you have your gun on you?" Root whispers, leaning close in to her ear. She's wearing a bright blue dress that looks absolutely stunning on her, not that Shaw notices.

            "Of course," She shoots Root a look that says, clearly, _who the fuck do you think I am_.

            "Of course," Root echoes, her lips curling into a knowing smile, "Come on, we're going dancing."

            "Why?" Shaw is incredulous. Root merely raises her eyebrows in response.

            "Don't know yet." She murmurs, "Bring your gun."

            As she pulls Shaw to the dance floor, begins to lead them in a waltz Shaw frankly can't believe people still _do_ , Shaw's absolutely convinced she's going to die. She does not dance. And really, this is not how she planned to go down.

_we're gonna die young_

Halfway through the song someone throws a smoke grenade and then lets loose a hail of bullets. Their number. Of course.

            This is more like it. This, Shaw can handle.

            Until, that is, she gets shot.

 

_wild child looking good_

            It's not the worst she's ever been hit, not remotely close, but really there's no way to get used to a bullet to the knee, and she goes down, hitting her head. The first thing she sees when she comes too is Root.

            Root, to her pain-addled brain at least, looks like the goddess of death. It's a good look on her, and despite the fact that she's still trying desperately to breathe through the pain, Shaw can't help but smirk a little as Root disarms everyone else in the room with terrifying efficiency. The next thing she knows Root's leaning over her, brow furled in annoyance.

            "That wasn't supposed to happen," she says. Shaw's not feeling speech right now, so she doesn't argue. Just shrugs slightly as Root picks her up and carries her, bridal style, away from the scene.

            That night Root steals medical supplies from an ambulance to stabilize her knee until they can get back to the library. Among those medical supplies is, as it turns out, a morphine pump, so the next few days are a bit hazy to Shaw. She knows Harold's somehow got someone with access to an CT scanner in his pocket, and a good orthopedic surgeon.

            It's a month before Shaw's walking again, almost three before she's mission capable, and she is, predictably, fucking pissed. But on the bright side she feels better about Finch's insistence that they just kneecap folks now that she knows exactly how much pain she's causing those assholes.

            The answer is a lot.

            It's a lot of pain.

            Root teaches her some hacking skills, brings her wonderfully violent videogames to play. Shaw thinks maybe she feels guilty. But that might not be it at all--She might be mad at the Machine. Shaw thinks that could be it, given how often she's scowling and mumbling to what appears to be herself lately.

            Root never talks to herself.

            When Root talks, someone's always listening.

            Which is substantially more alarming than the alternative, no matter what the doctors she's seen may say.

 

_don't care who watches us when we tear it up_

            The first mission Shaw goes on when she's recovered is with Root, again, and it makes her feel positively _gleeful_ to be back in on the action, instead of watching over monitors and hearing over coms. It's exactly like stretching after a long time lying still, and she's restless and so ready to just let loose.

            Combined, they could definitely be the grim reaper. There's some small part of Shaw that enjoys that they aren't--the look of terror in the eyes of assailants when they realize that they could very easily be dead _but_ _they aren't_. Shaw doesn't feel merciful. She feels a little smug: It would have been so much simpler to just kill the assholes, but no, they're _better_ than that. And she doesn't mean morally. She's never much cared about morality or, for that matter, understood it. She means in terms of skill. They're so good at what they do that they don't need to kill, and the fear that inspires, the way they look at her when they realize...it's delicious.

            She's even come to appreciate the particular mixture of shock and gratitude they receive when they save someone who was not expecting to be saved. She doesn't much like gratitude, doesn't like being a savior, doesn't like when people think they owe her. That kind of attention and praise makes her uncomfortable.

            But she loves watching Root tear the world apart without regard for where the seams should be. She likes watching Harold sew it back up again. And she doesn't mind being watched while she helps.

_looking for some trouble tonight, yeah, take my hand I'll show you the wild side_

            The mission ends, as most do, on a bit of an adrenaline high. And when, five months ago, Shaw would have shrugged off her teammates and made her way back to her apartment and her bottle of whiskey, she's feeling unusually sociable tonight. At least, that's what she insists when she actually accepts Root's invitation to go clubbing. That this is an abnormality subject to her own whims and not at all a reaction to how glad she is to be out with Root again, or the various ways she's enjoyed the other woman's company over her recuperation. Root just smirks at her in that eerie, all-knowing way of hers.

            "All right," She says. Her is face way to close to be acceptable by platonic standards, but that's just Root, "I know a place you won't even have to change to go to. They'll love you looking all...grunge and butch."

            "All the better," Shaw responds, choosing not to comment on how she's _practical,_ not grunge, or the culturally specific context in which "butch" is used.

            (That cultural context, by the way, is queer. Shaw damn well knows this and isn't about to tell Root _how_ that knowledge came to pass. Besides. Root flirts; it's what she does. Part of her whole vaguely disturbing demeanor)

            So they go clubbing. Shaw just plans to drink and people-watch, really, but Root pulls her to the dance floor after their first couple shots. It's a fast, techno song with a clearly defined beat, and Root's hands on her hips, they're swirling together as Root leans against her, pressing her face to the side of Shaw’s in what would be a whisper but over the music is perhaps closer to a shout.

            "I'm sorry you got shot the last time we did this." Shaw swallows thickly, thinks about how the last time they went dancing was hardly _this_ , this grind, the feeling of Root's chest pressed against hers. The warmth of her body so intensely close. She means to respond, she does, but as Root draws her face back to look at Shaw, try to figure out why it's taking her _so long_ to answer Shaw finds herself turning towards her in a bruising kiss.

            Root's teeth pull her lips and Shaw's breathless and her defenses are way too far down and when they're done she's going to look like she's been kissed within an inch of her life and that's way too honest for Shaw but she can't bring herself to care.

            Not when Root feels so good against her.

 

_we'll keep dancing til we die_

Yeah, Shaw realizes as they pull apart in the disorienting, strobing lights of the club. The bass turned up loud enough to take over her own heartbeat. 

            This will probably get her killed.


	4. Quicksand

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Song for this one is by Caro Emerald, and while writing I listened to the acapella version.  
> Okay then, who's ready for some kinky sex?!?! Not you? Then don't read the last 2 paragraphs.
> 
> EDIT: Whoops! I somehow forgot to actually include the ending to this chapter when I copy-pasted it from my master document and I just now realized. My apologies--there are now 2 new paragraphs. I would have added them to todays chapter except for the whole. Song lyric thing.

_My telephone is ringing, but me and it are having a fight_

Root's got the faraway look on her face reserved for when she's listening to the Machine, and as she takes Shaw's hand, leads her out of the club to the alley behind without explanation, Shaw wonders _what on earth she's done_ , and wonders too if the Machine saw it coming. It's a thought that makes her a little sick, and she finally understands where those Vigilance jerks are coming from: It's sort of horrifying to know that there's a computer (slash god, according to Root) capable of knowing what she's going to do before she knows herself.

            Which is when she realizes that she's still holding Root's hand, even though they're no longer winding through the chaotic crowd, even though there's no reason for it. She drops it quickly--she doesn't _hold hands_ \--and sinks against the brick wall. It's only then that she realizes Root is grimacing, saying, "Oh shut up, would you?" glancing towards Shaw and clarifying, unnecessarily in this case, "Not you dear,"

            "I know." Shaw replies, throat thick with questions she can't quite bring herself to ask: What's she hearing? What's going on? Finally Root does something Shaw's never seen her do: She reaches up and turns off her cochlear implant.

            "She's being petty," Root says, as if that's any explanation, "She keeps giving me irrelevant information just because I didn't listen to her...."

            "When?" Root not listening to the Machine is a terrifying precedent and Shaw finds herself more than mildly alarmed.

            "She thinks you'll hurt me." is all Root says in response--not an answer by a long shot.

            "I probably will." Shaw finds herself saying. Root tilts her head in response, smile spreading across her face.

            "I look forward to it." She kisses Shaw firmly once more, and despite all her instincts telling her this is a horrible idea Shaw finds herself kissing back, scraping her teeth along Root's bottom lip and relishing in the gasp she receives in response before Root pulls away, flashes her a grin, and disappears into the dark.

_Stay on the other side, in a universe of crazy lies_

            It is not easy to avoid Root without drawing Harold's attention, but for the next few days, Shaw tries her best to do just that.

            She finds her mind drawn back to that kiss, over and over again. And she hates it, because she does not _dwell_ , but she can't forget the way her heart picked up and her head spun.

            Root is dangerous. Obviously, Root is dangerous, but three days later Shaw finally realizes what her subconscious has been telling her all along: Root is dangerous _to her_. Kissing Root is _dangerous_. Which is finally what tips Shaw over into going to find her: She does not back away because something is dangerous. She is not a coward.

            And she needs to deal with the distraction Root presents before it messes her up.

_now you're sinkin' in, in my quicksand_

            She knows where Root lives, of course. She found the apartment Root keeps in New York shortly after Root woke her up in the middle of the night and tased her again. Fair's fair, she figures: If you're going to know how to break into my place you can damn well be sure I'm going to know how to break into yours.

            But she doesn't break in tonight.

            She knocks, shoulders tense, feeling small and hesitant as she does so. Which annoys her.

            Maybe that's why, as soon as Root opens the door, she surges forward and kisses her again before saying anything. Her fingers tangle in Root's hair, and Root's lithe hands claw at her waist, push her shirt up, use just enough fingernail to leave Shaw hissing into the kiss, arching into the touch. Finally she breaks away, tugging Root's hair sharply, delighting in the breathy gasp she receives in response.

            "I want you to fuck me," she whispers low and almost menacing against the shell of Root's ear. "But that's all this can be, all right?"

            "Yes," Root's response is immediate, and her eyes are filled with dark intention, "Yes of course Sameen." She places a hand on Shaw's chest, pushes her back until the edge of the bed is pressed behind her knees, and she kisses her again, and again Shaw thinks the universe is narrowing to this point, to the sheer _want_ she's feeling.

            "How much do you want it to hurt?" Root asks her.

            "I want it to leave marks. I want to feel it tomorrow." Root's breath intakes sharply, and something in Shaw is glad, glad she can make her feel this way without so much as touching her, with only her words.

            "Red-yellow-green signals work for you?"

            "Yes" Root grins again, more than a little akin to the Cheshire cat, before she shoves Shaw down onto the bed. She's feral; Shaw's always known this, always been drawn to it, actually, but never as much as she is in this moment, as Root begins quickly divesting them both of their clothes.

            "Anything I should avoid?" It's her final question, and Shaw almost wishes she hadn't asked. The earlier inquiries were fine, were establishing that Shaw has just as much power here as Root does, and that's what Shaw wants. But this, this sounds like Root _caring_ about her, and she doesn't want that. That's...messy and confusing and it's a moment before Shaw meets Root's eyes again.

            "No." She responds--hoping that if she says it firmly enough it will become a challenge, will force this weird emotional tinge at the edge of their actions to dissipate.

            Root doesn't say anything, then, just bites her way down Shaw's body, leaving what will definitely be bruises tomorrow and Shaw's pressing into them, her breathing irregular, still a little too proud to beg Root to fulfill her growing desire. Then Root scrapes her teeth against a nipple, draws her fingernails down her stomach toward the heat of her core and Shaw cries out.

            "Root," she gasps, " _fuck me_ "

            "Uh-uh," Root almost laughs in reply, drawing away from her, "You've got to beg."

            "Make me" Shaw's eyes are hard; she raises an eyebrow in taunting challenge.

            "Oh," Root's breath is soft for a moment as she reaches for the drawer to her nightstand, returns with a pristine knife. The blade glints dangerously in the glimmering city light that streams in from the window, despite it being the middle night. Root's face is partially illuminated, she is terrifying and beautiful and when Shaw sucks in a breath it is not in fear but anticipation as Root continues, "I was so hoping you'd say that." 

_all these definitions of ecstasy, is how I got my fuse lit_

            Shaw's sure she's losing her mind as Root traces the knife teasingly along her upper thighs, pressing just hard enough to lightly bite into her. She should not be as wet as she is, with an actual murderer holding a weapon so close to her femoral artery, but she doesn't really care, just cares about the cool metal as Root gently, almost _carefully_ , slides the flat of the blade up along her sternum. Finally, she relents: She's so overcome by desire, the sting of the marks left behind a hissing counterpoint to the pleasure of Root touching her, teasing her, kissing her neck at the junction of her shoulder.

            "Please Root. Please," She begs, but it's not quite enough, and Root merely quirks an eyebrow at her.

            "Please what?"

            "Fuck me Root. Please fuck me."

            "I'm afraid," Root says slowly, "That you'll need to be more specific. What do you want Shaw?"

            "I want your fingers. I want you inside me and your hand against my mouth I want to come _please_..." She trails off, and Root smiles again.

            "Good girl," she says, and Shaw hates how much _that_ turns her on but it does, another flood of arousal triggered as Root lays the knife back down on the nightstand, rises to her knees above Shaw's body, whispers, "Beautiful" before plunging two fingers roughly into her, hand covering Shaw's mouth just as she'd asked--not restricting her breathing, just muffling her sharp cries as the pace of her fingers increases, as she adds another, curling them back toward her palm on the outstroke until Shaw's shaking violently, screaming wordlessly beneath her until her whole body spasms and she comes over Root's hand.

 

            They lay there for awhile in silence, afterwards, catching their breath. And in silence, Shaw stands up, nearly half an hour later, finds her clothes in the dark, and whispers, "Thank you," so soft Root can barely hear it before leaving into the early morning.

 

_there's a whole world waitin' down below_

            They don't speak of it, the next day. Or the day after that: They carry on working as if nothing has happened, as if Shaw doesn't have bruises under the high neck of her hoodie, as if her legs don't still ache. As if she hasn't dreamt of Root above her, every night, as if she hasn't replayed leaving in her head over and over again, as though repetition will somehow change the outcome. As though there is a different choice for her to make.

            There's not, she tells herself firmly.

            But there is, and she tries to ignore what it means that she wants to hold Root in her arms, this deceptively delicate woman, wants to kiss her forehead and curl up with her in sleep.

            Still. When the next mission is finished, when the number is safe, she follows Root wordlessly back to her apartment, kissing her again as soon as the door is closed. And if Root mutters something like, " _finally_ " as they fall into bed again she ignores her. It's just Root's fingers this time that press at her bruises, at her healing cuts, watching in delight as she squirms and gasps and yes, _begs_ beneath her. It's Root's thighs, this time, that bracket her head as she drowns in her own arousal and flushes red in the face as she licks up into her, Root's orgasm that threatens to bring the neighbors, complaining, to the door.

            Shaw loves the taste of it, the texture, the sound, the weight as Root slides back against her chest, just barely allowing her to breathe.

            She shouldn't have done this again, she realizes. Should have left this as a one-time thing. Shouldn't have risked the feeling of _affection_ that settles in her as Root kisses down her body.

            She should have kept walking away.

_I can see you sinkin' down_

            But as Root smirks up at her before humming around her clit, she can't bring herself to regret the choice she's made.


	5. Song for Dennis Brown

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Get ready for some Mountain Goats, my friends, and for some denial  
> ALSO pls note that the previous chapter now has 2 more paragraphs that I didn't adequately copy over originally. Whoops :P

_And for a while there it was chaos_

It is amazing how what was once unimaginable becomes expected without Shaw really even noticing. Following Root home after a mission--because Shaw always follows, Root hasn't come back to her house since the tasing incident--starts off as impulsive.

            It quickly becomes routine.

            She's conflicted about Root never finding her: Part of her, some small whispering part at the back of her brain she wouldn't have noticed at all a year ago, but does now because _she's working on it_ , wants to be wanted. By Root.

            Most of her is glad these encounters always happen on her terms. It's the balm to how much she's willing to lay herself vulnerable before Root--how much she allows, encourages, actually, Root to tie her down or blindfold her or _hurt_ her. It would be far too much to let Root be in her space doing that. Far too much to do it because Root's asked.

_When the birds come home in spring, we will fill them full with buckshot_

            Root is still her favorite person to work with. She wasn't sure, at first, that she would be now that they're doing...whatever it is they're doing. But as frustrating as Root's face is when she smiles at Shaw as if they're talking in their own language, as much as the constant unspoken innuendo between them makes her itch, there is still nothing quite like going hunting with Root.

            She is powerful in a way that belies her frame, she always takes their antagonists by surprise: They write her off as small, as weak, as a woman, as insane, and Root makes them pay for that mistake tenfold.

            It is probably one of the Seven Wonders of the World, watching Root reign over destruction and death, watching Root pardon and learn mercy.

            Root calls the Machine a goddess: Shaw wonders what that makes her.

            She wonders what it makes them both.

_And jets of contaminated blood will cloud the rivers and the lakes_

            They are a stain on the world: They are grime and bloody sheets and the bad parts of town personified with a vengeance. They are myths, are ghost stories.

            Sometimes, Shaw wonders what her legacy will be. Not out of pride, but out of _irony_ , because someone will remember her as a patriot, and someone as a traitor, and many, now, as a savior.

            But all these things are not her distilled so much as they are her filtered: all of these things are better, perhaps, than what she actually is.

            And when she's having sex like it's a battle, when Root is squirming beneath her and later, when she's submitting to Root, begging her to use the knife again, to cut her open, the idea that someone somewhere thinks she is a good person nearly makes her laugh.

            She is many things, and all of them are burnt by the fire of her inherent violence.

            And none of them she'd call _good_.

_It took all the coke in town to bring down Dennis Brown_

They stop a politician from killing her mistress to avoid a sex scandal. She was incredibly thorough in covering her tracks, it takes them quite a substantive amount of work to dig up enough evidence to lock her away. Shaw marvels at how fragile human status is, and how much it's valued. She doesn't quite understand.

            That's one advantage to being legally dead: She has no social standing whatsoever.

_On the day my lung collapses, we'll see just how much it takes_

            Would what she's doing with Root be enough for someone to hold over her? For her to lose her power?

            She thinks, that for most people, it would.

            But not her: Root is not a weakness, a point that is exploitable, because she doesn't care who knows or what they say and, she insists, she doesn't care about Root either.

            Root's just hot. And convenient. And they're into complimentary things.

            That's all.


	6. No Children

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mountain Goats again! I am sorry for missing our usual Sunday update this week, I was finishing off a ridiculously time-consuming school program. Anyway, hope all y'all in America have a delightful Thanksgiving today, and as always I am so grateful to you for reading :) Enjoy.

_I hope that our few remaining friends give up on trying to save us_

            The next time they work with Zoe she pulls her aside and tells her she's glad the two of them have finally got together. Shaw isn't sure why she'd be glad about this or how she figured it out, and tells her as much. Zoe just rolls her eyes at her, tells her to get back to her girlfriend before Root melts her with her eyes.

            That throws Shaw for a bit of a loop because Root isn't her girlfriend: that implies some kind of sappy bullshit she doesn't do. She lets it go because she thinks that Zoe, the third most terrifying woman she knows (after her and Root: yes, she's counting herself. It's not egotistic if it's true) just tried to be supportive of her. And that's...nice of her, she guesses.

            A few days later on a stakeout Reese asks if working with Root is going to make her a liability. She asks him if working with Zoe has ever made him a liability, which shuts him up quickly because while they both know his relationship with her hasn't and probably won't interfere with his mission-readiness, his relationship with Harold definitely has and he doesn't want her calling him on it.

            She's looking forward to the two of them working out that their blatant affection for each other has an unmistakably romantic and, for that matter, erotic undertone. That'll be a shitshow for the ages, but when the dust clears she might not have to deal with Reese _pining_ so much any more. It's getting really annoying. 

            The next time she's in the library to visit Bear, Finch haltingly tells her he supports her relationship with Root, says it will be good for them both.

            She tells him it probably won't be and that he seems to have the wrong idea.

_I hope we hang on past the last exit, I hope it's already too late_

            She's sensing a pattern and it bugs her a little, but not overly: She works with people who have spent years learning to be observant. It stands to reason they'd notice _something_ was up between her and Root

            They've misinterpreted _what_ , exactly, that is. They've mistaken the way Root says her name, brushes a hand against her back as she passes her, as some kind of affection. They've confused the way Shaw smiles back at her for tenderness.

_In my life, I hope I lie_

            Because Shaw doesn't do affection, doesn't do _romance_. She doesn't care about people, she never really has. It's how she wound up in this line of business after all: People come in and out of her life and sometimes when they leave it's inconvenient, as it was with her father and Cole, and sometimes it's a relief.

            So the fact that she hasn't gone a day without seeing Root in the past two months at least, that doesn't mean anything. Doesn't mean she cares. Just that Root's in her life right now, and when she leaves Shaw will be fine.

            Right?

_I hope I die, I hope we both die_

            Except, when Root goes to deal with some sort of Machine-related business all the way out in fucking Illinois and is gone for a week, Shaw _notices_. It's like there are holes in her day where Root should be.

            She finds herself full of things she wants to say to Root.

            And when she's in her own apartment at a reasonable hour for the first time in what feels like forever it feels stifling. Boring.

            She's in her own space, but she wants to be in Root's apartment (in Root's bed) clawing and biting like a caged beast. Wants Root to slip out for take out and come back with ghormeh sabzi because she knows it was Sameen's favorite, growing up, and it doesn't matter that she had to go all the way across the city to get it, Shaw did so good tonight and Root's just saying thank you. She misses the lilting tone of Root's voice, misses riding into battle with her.

            She hates it, hates that she is unhappy without Root. It makes her feel weak, and she wants to kill that weakness in her. Wants to stop whatever this is before she can't live without it, because she knows better than to have anything she can't live without. She has to be malleable. She has to be okay if she needs to leave her apartment on a moment's notice, has to be okay when people walk away from her. And she's terrified that she's getting too attached.

            But that doesn't mean she stays away when Root gets back.

_Our friends say its darkest before the sunrise, we're pretty sure they're all wrong_

            One night she kneels on the floor for Root, gagged, and holds her position, trying her very best not to move at all as Root raises welts across her back, the back of her legs. Her knees press into the uneven wooden floorboards beneath her, its own kind of plateauing pain. She loves the sting, the burn, is so turned on by the time Root finally presses her fingers roughly into her, pulling her head back to nip at her neck as she does so, whisper absolutely filthy things in her ear, that it takes her almost no time at all to come. Twice, actually.

            All of which to say that, even once Root's ungagged her, even when her hands have gently coated her injuries with salve, even after she's helped her onto the bed and brought ice to dull the blooming bruises across her knees, even after more tenderness from the other woman than she can reasonably stand, she's not quite fit to go home.

            It's three in the morning and her legs are sore, and sitting isn't going to be terribly comfortable, and it's snowing outside but cozy in Root's bed, so without entirely intending too she just kind of....stays.

            The world, somehow, doesn't end when she learns that Root is not actually a morning person at all. But just like she knew Harold's preferred green tea before he actually told her, she knows Root has a inexplicable fondness for flavored mochas. Shaw finds them saccharine, but they fit Root, in a way, and instead of just leaving in the morning Shaw goes and gets them coffee, brings it back to Root's.

            She tells herself it's because Root needs to wake up anyway, they've got work to do, and if she leaves her to her own devices it's quite possible they'll be waiting for her another solid three hours.

            For someone so persistently energetic when she sets her mind to something she really is lethargic without a goal of her own designing. Like a cat, fickle and self-determined and definitely not about to be calm when you want it to or awake when it needs to be.

            Shaw tells herself the way Root smiles when she sees her sitting fully dressed on the corner of the bed holding out a peculiar raspberry-flavored coffee concoction, face her usual mask of indifference, makes her feel annoyed. Surely that's what the clenching she feels in her stomach is.

            Annoyance.

_I hope it stays dark forever, I hope the worst isn't over_

            After that first night it's just a matter of convenience: Root's place is nicer and closer to the library, and Shaw's really not big on traveling about more than she has to.

            Eventually she stops returning home to re-stash her weapons after a mission, instead opting to take over a nearly-empty cabinet in Root's kitchen. And a drawer in her closet. And the nightstand on the side of the bed Root doesn't tend to sleep in.

            She has a lot of weapons, okay, and Root has a lot of space.

            And if she suspects that Root condensed her clothes so that there'd be a free drawer where previously there was none, well, she doesn't mention it.

_And I hope you blink before I do, I hope I never get sober_

            Living with Root is a battle of wills, both implicit and explicit. It's a struggle between affection and the abject denial that such affection could ever exist.

            Every conversation they have is a skirmish of sorts.

            It's intoxicating.

            Shaw hopes it lasts forever and can't stand it in the same confused breath.

_I am drowning, there is no sign land, you are coming down with me_

            But it's okay, it's all right that they exist in this murky netherworld of staying and leaving, of harshness and kindness.

            Because surely, Root feels the same way.

            Her tendency to press Shaw to talk of _emotion_ , of all things, that's certainly her going on the offensive. Surely she does that out of the same bitterness that Shaw feels in refusing. That must be her trying to get Shaw to leave, only to give it up and give in the same way Shaw does every time she cooks Root dinner at midnight because it makes her smile.

            Of course, Root is as ambivalently fond of this situation as Shaw is.

            Right?

_Hand in unlovable hand._

            Wrong, _obviously_.

            Shaw's misinterpreted, again. She's misread the signals and she's kicking herself for not understanding, for not realizing that.....

            That whatever it is that's brought them to this place, sitting at the kitchen table, Root's doe-eyes damp and lip quivering as she tells Shaw that she _can't keep doing this_ has been growing for a long time.

            Because Root's telling her she _loves her_ , her hand holding hers across the table, and when Shaw realizes _that's_ what's going on her she abruptly pulls away.

            "It was just sex. We said it was just sex." Shaw's insisting in response, rare panic seeping into her voice. She's supposed to be observant. She's supposed to be prepared, and she doesn't understand how this has happened without her noticing.

            "It stopped being just sex when you started coming over every night. It stopped being just sex when you _moved in_ , for fuck's sake Sameen." And there's the anger in Root's voice that Shaw assumed was always there. Only it turns out it wasn't. She's gotten quiet, she's talking slowly, leaning forward and fixing Shaw with an intense glare.

            God, Shaw's an idiot.

            "You live here! In my apartment! And you make me pancakes at five in the morning because my ear's hurting and it's woken me up and you expect me to go along with the ruse that this is _just sex_ to you? Because it's definitely not to me." Root's still ranting though, to be honest, Shaw's not entirely sure she's absorbing the information. Until, that is, she hears this:

            "So I can't...I can't do this thing any more where I pretend that I'm more than just a convenience to you. I'm leaving."

            "Root, this is your fucking apartment." Shaw's nearly yelling, can only translate the feeling that she's being stepped on into anger. Her fallback emotion. Her faithful friend. Anger's gotten her through everything before, it'll get her through this. But Root just laughs bitterly.

            "I'm leaving the city." She clarifies, "I'm going to DC. The machine's wanted me there for awhile, only _I_ managed to convince _her_ that I could work it out from here." Shaw looks a little dumbstruck, so she continues, "You forget, all of you, that she doesn't just see New York. You're so caught up in your futile little war that you've forgotten that it's not just that you can't stop bad things happening _here_ , it's that she only sends you the numbers within the radius where you could actually _maybe_ impact them. As if people don't premeditate violent crimes in Los Angeles, in New Orleans. She shows you mercy, not that you notice. And I've always been more use to her elsewhere. So I'm _leaving_." She finally stands up and does just that, pausing at the door to sneer over her shoulder, "Give Harold my regards."

            And then it's just Shaw

            In the middle of the apartment she's been living in for the past three months that's definitely not hers.

            Alone.

            Again.


	7. Fuck Was I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song of the chapter is by Jenny Owens-Young. It's an angst fest. Enjoy!

_Love grows in me like a tumor, a parasite bent on devouring its host_

            Shaw moves back to her own apartment, tries to pretend it's all fine, tries to pretend she's fine, but she's not. There's a feeling inside her like her chest is collapsing in on itself, like the world is duller, and she hates it.

            Not because it hurts, though she hates that too. She hates it because she was never supposed to feel this way. Or maybe she was, at one point, but that was a long time ago. Before the marines recruited her, before they shuttled her around the military apparatus until the most desirable skill she had, the skill of _not caring_ , was best utilized.

            She knows the world's trying to fuck everyone up. Hell, she's pretty sure it's _actively_ trying to fuck people up, these days. But she wasn't ever supposed to have that happen, because to be upset when something's missing you have to care about it first and she was Not. Supposed. To. Care.

            She's a perfectionist, and for the first time in a long time she thinks she's failed, because there's this feeling growing inside her like a tangible thing, this despair over which she has no control.

            This belated realization that she cares, more deeply than she imagined possible, about Root, of all people. About the woman whose introduction was attempted torture and whose re-introduction was kidnapping. She cares about _her_.

            And it's eating away at her concentration, it's distracting her from her primary form of self-definition: Her job. And she's not so hungry, any more, and the whiskey she swipes from Finch just tastes like soap. So she wonders: what of herself does she have left?

            Everything she thought she was has been consumed by this awful _caring_.

_I'm developing my sense of humor_

            It's _funny,_ in a way. That she feels so upended by something she's done a million times--leaving.

            Sometimes she can't tell if she's laughing or sobbing.

            The tears running down her cheeks and pooling in the back of her throat would, for many, indicate the later. But Shaw doesn't _cry_.

_Til I can laugh at my heart between your teeth_

            Even when there's a black hole growing in her chest. Even when the heart she swore she didn't have has stopped whispering her emotions and instead turned the volume up way too fucking loud, Shaw doesn't cry.

            She laughs.

            Because some part of her most of known that someday it would come to this. What was it Root told her, after their first kiss? _She thinks you'll hurt me_. She remembers her own response clearly, it echoes in her head but instead of fading it magnifies with every bounce: _I probably will._

_I probably will_

            Yeah. She's got to have known this was coming.

_What the fuck was I thinking_

            What was she thinking, all those months ago, when she showed up at Shaw's apartment?

            What was she thinking when she came back again?

            And again?

            What was she thinking when she _moved in_?

            She looks back at all the places she could have made a different choice. All the ways this outcome was far from inevitable. And she can't figure it out, can't figure out _why_ she just kept coming back again and again and _why_ she was fine living with Root when she could barely manage to deal with her bunkmates back in the Marines much less someone she's _fucking_ much less someone she's, she's falling, she's falling in--

            What the fuck was she thinking?

_Love tears me up like a demon, opens the wounds and then fills them with lead_

This caring thing sucks.

            It hurts, and Shaw knows from hurt. She's been tortured and tased and stabbed and sliced and shot in multiple places.

            In a way, this hurts more. She can't just lose consciousness and stop dealing with it. She can't separate her mind from her body and ignore this pain, because it's in her mind. And with the sympathetic clenching of her chest, with the aches in her joints, it's in her body too.

            So while it's surely not the _worst_ pain she's been in, it's the hardest to deal with. It's the most annoying.

            And god, isn't that ironic too? In terms of sheer count, she found Root most annoying of any of her co-workers.

            (She ignores that, in terms of proportion of moments-of-annoyance to moments-of-other-feelings, Root was the least)

_If we weren't such good friends I think that I'd hate you_

            She wishes she could hate Root now. Wishes she could feel that annoyance she's so used to, wishes she could roll her eyes while Root talks about the Machine as _god_.

            Root would have to be here for her to do that.

            And Root would have to be...somehow less incredible than she is, for Shaw to stay mad at her very long. She's never been good at being mad at Root. Hasn't really been since that time she shot her in that nuclear facility. And as soon as that was done she was forgiven, not that she'd tell Root that.

            But Shaw doesn't patch people she's just shot up when she hasn't forgiven them, and you'd think that this would be a strange occurrence, a one-off, but you'd be forgetting that Shaw's worked for the single _most dubious_ branches of the government. It's hardly the first time she's tried to heal someone she harmed.

            That's how Shaw's anger works: It doesn't fester, doesn't build up within her. It explodes outward, the charge behind the bullet, and then it dissipates and is gone.

            Usually, this works out well for Shaw: Holding a grudge, having a vendetta is just an even faster way to get dead.

            It doesn't seem to be in her favor now.

 

_If we weren't such good friends I'd wish you were dead_

            There's a tiny part of her that wishes she could kill Root and have this pain be done with.

            There's a large part of her that knows that the pain isn't coming from Root but because Root's _gone_ , that putting a bullet or five in the source of her consternation is really going to be counterproductive this time.

            But god, she wishes there was some tangible thing she could _do_ , something she could lash out against.

            Some way violence could be the answer.

            (There's not)

           

_I'm this awkward and uncomfortable thing_

            Of course, Shaw doesn't tell the team anything at all. The next day she walks into the library, tells Harold that Root's taken off without a hitch in her voice or a quiver in her face.

            But they don't have a number for a few days and Harold starts to notice that Shaw's been around more often, sitting on the ground with Bear.

            And when they do get a number, and her and Reese go tailing, he notices something too.

            "You've been unusually quiet," he tells her.

            "Not like I talk much anyway" Her answer isn't even so much her usual sarcastic as it is tired. He shoots her a withering look: _going to play it like that, huh?_

            "Something to do with Root leaving?" he asks.

            "No." She tries to be firm, but she's been caught off guard, which is again _stupid_ of her because, of course, they've all known about her and Root. In the end her monosyllabic answer sounds more like a question anyway and she's kicking herself. But Reese lets it go, for now.

            They're walking around New York City and Shaw feels like an exposed nerve: Everywhere she looks she thinks she sees Root. She thinks she hears Root's voice, or her name, in the constant din of sounds. And she can't shut it out, can't quite focus as she's been trained to do on only what's relevant. On their mission she's as jumpy as a live wire, barely makes it out intact.

_I'm running out of places to hide it_

Harold and Reese stage a fucking intervention-of-sorts.

            They've always been overly dramatic.

            And they've cornered her in the library with Bear, brought her steak and whiskey and while she picks around the edges Harold begins to speak.

            "Something is clearly wrong, Ms. Shaw," he begins, looking pleadingly at Reese who just shrugs in return before he continues, "I know you're used to being more...independent, but you're on our team now, and if there's anything we can do to help..."

            Shaw takes pity on him, responds by saying, "Probably your damn fault, the two of you." She sighs, looks at their blank faces, rolls her eyes and clarifies, "You've got so many _feelings_ it figures they'd be fucking contagious."

            At that they both understand as much as she'll let them. Well, a little more than she'd like, but as she mentioned, there was an _intervention_ with bait that was also, she realizes, a test.

            She confirmed their hypothesis, whoop-de-do.

            Reese takes her out for ice cream. Figures he'd be into the cliché ice-cream-and-movie post break up routine.

            Finch tells her, awkward and halting as usual, about how it won't always hurt so much. But she's not sure she believes him: It's pretty evident their emotions don't work the same way. He lets her take Bear home, though, says it's important not to be alone in times of emotional turmoil.

            And well, even he knows that feelings revelation aside she's not about to let either of them hang around her too much.


	8. Fire/Fear

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes well, Surprise! I am back. Tons of love and gratitude to everyone who's read, commented, kudosed this work in the past...7 months? 8? I'm sorry for the long unscheduled hiatus. We've got a few more chapters (by which I mean 5) but this work is drawing to an end.  
> While much of what you'll see in the near future I'm just writing now, this chapter was actually written pre-hiatus and just never got posted. So here we are: character background and just a touch more solitary angst before the drama and sex return in full force :P  
> Song this time is from the Head and The Heart, please enjoy.

_You never had much to lose, so I'm blaming you for these hopeless blues_

            She tries to find some way to blame Root for all that has happened. If she hadn't been there for her when she was out of the field. If she hadn't kissed her back. If she hadn't turned the Machine's voice off every time they fucked. If her hands were less beautiful and wise and....If she hadn't brought Shaw food, all those times in the middle of the night. If she hadn't smiled at her _like that_ , like she can see right through all her masks and diversions and mirrors and she _knows her_ but likes what she sees anyway. If she'd told Shaw earlier.....

            It doesn't work.

            Shaw is an adept liar. She always has been, when it suits her, and even, she supposes, some times when it doesn't.

            But this being Root's fault isn't a lie she can make even herself believe.

_There's no way to write what's been done wrong_

            One night, Shaw is feeling _lonely_ for the first time since Cole died, the world is too still and stifling and even in the constant din of New York City she wishes for sounds she cannot hear. Sensations she cannot feel, alone in the darkness of a cloudy 2 am.

            That night, she hacks the NSA database the way Root showed her how, all those months ago. Deletes the list of people they've been monitoring--that'll get the Machine's attention--and replaces it with Catullus 85.

 

            She debates leaving it in English briefly before dismissing that out of hand: If Root can't read Latin (and Shaw would be a little surprised if that were the case) the Machine can surely translate it for her.

            Besides, it feels right to present it to her the same way Shaw first encountered it, freshman year of college taking Latin because god knows it'd be useful in medicine. Her third language. She never told Root how her mom spoke English to her when they were living in Iran, how when the revolution came for them and they left for America she began to speak only in Farsi instead. Always a contrarian, always taking the harder path, speaking the forbidden tongue. It's possible Sameen is more like her mother than either of them know, but that's hardly relevant now. Her mother was told she died when she left the CIA for Control. It's cleaner that way. Less risk, less attachment, fewer lies to be told to perhaps the one person on Earth with a shot in hell of catching her in a falsehood.

            Shaw hasn't told Root any of this but illuminated by the blue glow of her computer screen she almost wishes she could. Or could tell her that she always loved Catullus. The vengeance and fire and bitterness and violence of his words--his anger spoke to her. His poems are crass, and she is too.

            And now, the tearing he describes? _I hate and I love. Perhaps you ask why I do this?/I do not know, but I feel it happen and I am torn apart_

            It speaks to her too.

_I want to feel the fire again, with you or anybody else_

            Sometimes, when she was with Root, she'd feel like she was being consumed. Like the slow oxidation in her blood had sped up, and she was combusting bright light across dark sheets. Returning to the carbon cycle where her atoms belong.

            It was a disconcerting feeling, not being able to feel the sharp edges of her body. Not knowing exactly where her borders were, being formless instead. Melded into another. Liquid.

            Flame.

            It had hurt. Root had dripped wax across her chest, across her legs, and she'd hissed in reply, brain lost in the endless cycle of _pleasure-pain-pleasure-pain-pleasure_

            She misses the sting, the bite, the edge of her blade, the back of her hand, the abrasion of the ropes tying her in place. The physical _hurt_ that underlies the two of them together. Shaw read that in some cultures hunting was considered not like war but like sex instead. She thinks that's fitting for what they are together.

            She's not surprised to miss the sex. Not even surprised to miss that particular brand of painful sex she's never done more than once with the same partner, before Root.

            But she misses the emotional _ache_ of them too. The way the air between them sparked and jumped and was unsure if they should be pulled together or pushed apart. She misses the way her heart would clench when Root smiled at her, misses the way her breath would catch when she walked away with a wink, a smirk, a swing of her hips.

            That surprises her.

_I want to feel the fear again, with you or anybody else_

            She misses even the moments it felt like she was placing pieces of herself on Root's outstretched palms like an offering.

            They happened more than she'd like to admit.

            Little pieces usually: Every time she let Root know she _liked_ something or _didn't_ something else. And sometimes big pieces, the day Root learnt her favorite dish, the stew her mom made her on Saturdays.

            Those offerings, those truths, they terrify her.

            Because they are beyond her control--Lies, she knows how to rule. She is their master. They twirl and dance to her whims.

            The truth, on the other hand, is the puppet strings attached to her limbs.

            It's what winds her mechanical heart, the force in the shadows that keeps her silently ticking into the night.

            She's scared, that if Root learns too much of it, she'll be able to find the gears. Gracefully and blithely restructure them the way she does code.

            She misses that _fear_ , somehow.


	9. Did you here the rain?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alllllll right so this is a chapter where I start debating changing the rating on this fic, but honestly I'm not sure: What do you think friends, M or E?   
> Which is to say  
> Brace yourself  
> Things get steamy  
> (song is by George Ezra)

_oh did you hear the thunder, or the rain, means I'm coming home again_

            To be honest, it takes her unusually long to reach an actionable conclusion. Normally she's all about _action_ , all about plans that can be executed. It would be easy to assume this is a trait she picked up in the military: It is not. She always was more about things that can be done over things that can merely be thought. That's why she was a great doctor, bedside manner be damned.

            Anyway, it's fully _two months_ before she gets her shit together.

            It's two months before she decides: Root wants me to communicate my feelings and shit? Fine. I'll be the best damn feelings-communicator there is. And I'll woo back the girl.

            (Yes, she does think 'woo'--she just finished reading that fucking book with Heathcliff. When she told Harold she thinks the book'd be better if all the characters were dead, he looked aghast. And the next day Reese wordlessly handed her a copy of _Pride and Prejudice and Zombies_.)

            The point is, when she sets out to do something, she does it and she does it _well_.

            This...particular mission may require some research, but she's determined nonetheless.

            She doesn't think Austen novels will suffice. No. She's going to have to go to an expert.

            And the only expert she knows in _this_ particular field is....wait, she'll think of...fucking hell Carter really would have been the one to talk to, because she's not about to go to _Harold_ or _Grace_ , and Reese is just as emotionally constipated as she is....

            Which brings her to Zoe Morgan.

            Probably not the best choice in terms of learning to be _heartfelt_ , considering her line of work, but she is a generally honest person, and she won't tease too much, and Shaw's pretty sure she's got some experience in romancing ladies.

            Not that Root's exactly a _lady_ in the traditional sense. But that's okay: Zoe's also got experience seducing sociopaths.

_Did you steal my name?_

            (It's important, that she figures this thing out with her and Root.

            Because she isn't quite sure she knows who exactly she _is_ , any more.

            It's been a long time since she had an identity crisis. Maybe her whole life.

            She doesn't tell this to Zoe.

            But the way Zoe looks at her, she probably knows

            And for the record, Shaw was totally right.

            Zoe is, in her own words, an opportunistic bisexual)

_I was born a champion, I was born to jump and run_

            Still, while she may not know who she is, she does know damn good and well what she's good at. Pursuing. Evasion. Attack. Defense. War.

            It's convenient that they are both fighting on roughly the same side of roughly the same secret war. And it's convenient that when Shaw threatens not to help the machine unless it brings Root back to New York, it actually _works_. She wasn't expecting it to--unlike Harold and Reese and Root she's never been an administrator, but apparently she's succeeded in making herself valuable to it. Or, and this is a truly horrifying thought, perhaps her relationship with Root is valuable to it? She doesn't want to think about that too much, but it's a hard thought to escape when Root shows up at her doorstep, doesn't quite meet her eyes, and tells her the Machine said to get her for this particular mission.

            They succeed, of course, but working together is not as fluid as it used to be. There's an awkward silence where banter used to be, and Shaw doesn't ask for explanations and Root doesn't answer in riddles. They're tiptoeing around each other, that first mission. Root doesn't mention Catullus and Shaw doesn't ask. Soon enough the question isn't even on her mind anymore, just faded into the background simmer of their stilted conversation.

            Root gets as integrated into the team as she ever has been with ease. And neither of them complains when they're sent out together--by the machine, by Harold with a knowing look--but the fluidity that used to define them is still missing. It's frustrating Shaw. She wants to get it back.

_Oh Lucifer’s inside_

            Love stories, in Shaw's admittedly limited experience, are about good people. You read them because you want the characters to be happy. Because somehow you think they _deserve_ that happiness.

            Root and Shaw are still not, and probably will never be, good people.

            But even the devil was an angel once.

            Shaw thinks about the last time she was a good person. She's not sure if she remembers it, now, but there must have been a moment. When are you old enough to be a bad person? She's never bought the idea of original sin nor, for that matter, reincarnation. If a baby cannot be _bad_ , surely a toddler can't either, and if a toddler can't, what about a ten year old? Twelve? Sixteen? Eighteen? Shaw remembers being eighteen, and while she surely felt adult then, she looks at eighteen-year-olds now and she sees children.

            Maybe no one, ever, can be a bad person.

            But that can't be right: She's a vigilante and a killer and maybe she's doing this for all the right reasons but that doesn't mean that, for every orphan like Gen she saves, she hasn't somewhere left another child orphaned and alone in her wake.

            It doesn't much matter though, because she's pretty sure Root isn't drawn to her for her moments of goodness. They are both of them far too amoral for that.

            There isn't much fictional precedent for seducing bad people so Shaw quietly, discretely, looks to history instead. Reads letters between Virginia Woolf and Vita Sackville-West that were surely never meant for public consumption. They are bittersweet in a way that resonates with her: Here are two people who were very bad for each other but deliciously in love anyway. Maybe she and Root were like that, before. Maybe what she's yearning for is to be like that again.

            Not so much morally ambiguous as they are morally neutral.

            And drawn together as though by gravity, or some other force that is both ubiquitous and generally unnoticed.

_I was wasting up your time, oh, now you're wasting mine_

            Shaw starts bringing Root coffee in the morning. A different flavor every day, because she knows Root likes variety. She brings tea for Harold, too, and little shots of straight-up (ha) espresso for Reese.

            Root never acknowledges this, the beverages left for her in her former cell, her favorite office space. She drinks them, Shaw knows, because she sees her take the cardboard cups out on surveillance, some mornings. And because the room always smells overly sweet when she enters it.

            At first this is a victory, this is More Than Enough.

            After a month, Shaw's growing impatient. She wonders just how long it will take before Root speaks to her.

            Until one morning as spring begins to mature into summer and the machine is uncharacteristically undemanding, Shaw returns to Root's (their?) apartment and knocks briskly on the door, intending to ask just that.

_You put me back in line, and I'm counting every link, and I guess you think that's fine_

            Root's reaction to Shaw showing up on her doorstep isn't quite what Shaw was expecting. She arches an eyebrow, stepping aside to let her in. After a moment of tense silence, eyes appraising, she turns her back to Shaw with a sigh and brushes her hair away from her face, gently pulling the strands that stick on her implant back into order.

            "Why are you here?" she finally asks, sounding uncharacteristically exhausted.

            "I...I..." It turns out, for all her research into this moment, Shaw's not quite ready to be vulnerable. She splutters for a second before returning with an unintentionally biting question of her own, "When are you going to talk to me again?"

            "I thought I was doing just that" Root snaps back and Shaw shrinks into herself further.

            "That's not what I meant," she replies softly.

            "Then what do you mean, Sameen?" Root turns back towards her and, though her face remains neutral as ever her using _Sameen_ , that name no one else has spoken in so long, nearly fractures Shaw's aching heart.

            "I mean....I mean I want things back the way they were before." At this Root rolls her eyes, takes a step towards her with a huff.

            "Oh?" She asks, biting, continuing to advance on Shaw, something in her eyes causing Shaw to back away, "And what is that _dear_? You want to fuck me? Or you want me to fuck you raw? You want to kiss me at seven in the morning and then pretend you don't know what I taste like less than an hour later? You want to come and go with no warning? You want to destroy me because, for some reason, _I still fucking love you_ and you _still don't care_?" Root's nearly yelling at this point and Shaw's all the way backed up against the wall, head bracketed by Root's arms.

            "No!" She doesn't really mean to be but she's yelling in reply, "No," she repeats, quieter but no more calm. "I want you. I want you to fuck me and I want it to hurt and I want to kneel for you and lick my way up your body. I want to fight with you and dance with you and sleep with you and make fucking pancakes with you in the morning and I know, I know I'm not good at _having_ emotions, much less talking about them. I know I'm not good for you, okay, but I'm _trying_ because for some reason when you left it felt like my _entire fucking life_ just stopped and I _ached_ for you all the time so I blackmailed the machine into bringing you back because I'm selfish, all right? Only now that you're here everything is still _wrong_ and _you won't talk to me the way you used to_ and I....I...." She finally calms down enough to look at Root. Root looks as broken as she feels, and she slides down the wall with a small sob of catharsis. "I need you."

_Oh did I send a shiver down your spine?_

            Root is on the floor on her knees with Shaw in an instant, hesitantly reaching out to brush a hand against her cheek. Testing if she's real, Shaw supposes. She doesn't blame her. She'd wonder if she'd been replaced by some kind of imposter too, after that little monologue. She's not sure she's ever said so many words in a row before. Slowly, gently, Root guides her head up until she has nowhere to look but the face of her once-lover.

            "I need you too," she all but whispers, "God, Sam, I need you too". Their lips meet in a kiss that is still all teeth and force but is slower, somehow, now. Root nips at her lower lip and Shaw feels, paradoxically, like she can breathe again as she runs her hands over Root's soft skin. Her narrow hips and long limbs feel so impossibly _soft_ in this moment, and Shaw's dizzy with it.

            They stand together, slowly stripping each other of clothes, and it feels incredibly surreal. More so when Root pushes her sharply so she's sitting at the edge of her bed and crouches down to remove the boots she'd fully forgotten were on her feet.

            "I haven't forgiven you, you know" Root's eyes are cold, as she looks up at Shaw, but not unkind. It takes her a moment to process what she's hearing, distracted by the sight of Root in nothing but her underwear, but once she does she swallows thickly.

            "All right," she says shakily, "What can I do?" Root unbuttons her pants, pulls them off Sam's legs with an abrupt, harsh flick of her wrist. She lays her head against Sam's strong left thigh, running one hand across her right leg and up to her hip, to the scar on her side. Sam hasn't touched Root yet and this seems like a crime--one easily remedied by shifting her weight to her arm, leaning back for better access as she strokes Root's hair in that way she knows she likes.

            "Stay the night," Root says before sinking her teeth into her inner thigh and Shaw gasps, her body unsure if she wants to move away or towards her lover until the suction of her mouth abates and she places soothing kisses around the mark she's left.

            "Of course," Shaw swallows harshly.

            "Are you going to be my good girl, Sameen?" Root asks, nonchalant while Shaw is anything but. While her hips begin to move in small, wanting circles she can't quite control.

            "Yes," She whispers, pupils blown as Root stalks up her body with all the lithe grace and power of great cat.

            "Yes what?" Root asks, teasing as she peels Shaw's sports bra off over her head, runs her finger nails sharply down her now-exposed sides.

            "Yes Mistress," Shaw gasps. It's been a long time, but Shaw remembers their rules, their game. How could she forget?

            "That," Root sucks another bruise onto her shoulder, moving down her body once more to remove her sodden underwear, expose her hypersensitive center to the cold air, "Is just what I like to hear."

 

_Lord, I'm spreading like disease_

            That night, Shaw eats Root out like the champ she is. Licks up into her with a curled tongue, feels her heat, the way she pulses against her. Tastes tang she hasn't forgotten but never knew how to describe either, sucks and works her until she nearly can't breathe, hooks a finger inside Root and makes her beg for more until she's coming, she's coming in spasms against her hand, her cheek.

            That night, Shaw begs Root to tie her down and Root smiles and obliges, binding her wrists to the headboard and her ankles to the bedframe. She's spread and wanton and gasping, pleading, as Root teases across her body in scratches and bites and slaps that make the flesh of her stomach ripple. She's leaving bruises and they both want it, want to see Shaw all marked up the next day. When Root finally circles her clit with the tip of her index finger, not quite giving enough friction or pressure, Shaw cries out so loud the neighbors will surely hear through the thin apartment walls. When she finally fucks her, deftly pressing into her and scissoring her fingers apart, stretching her out, Shaw comes so hard she can't even tell how loud she's being.

            That night, Root unties her ankles first and then her wrists, and Sam wraps her in her arms, closes her eyes against the warm sweet scent of her forehead. They are sticky and their skin is rapidly cooling and they catch their breath nestled together, legs wrapped around each other, listening to the rapid beating of their hearts.

_Lord, I'm all up in your mind_

            In the morning, light streams through the curtains Shaw belatedly realizes they never closed--good thing they're as far above the street as they are--and they're still wrapped up together, until Root stirs awake. Then they just lie there together, faces a few inches a part, Root playing with her hair in a way that would be annoying as hell if it were anyone else but it isn't because it's Root.

            "I love you," Root whispers. And Shaw takes a deep breath.

            "I love you too," she whispers back.

            They both know, in all likelihood, that this is the first time Shaw's said those words, but they don't acknowledge it. Just keep laying there, knees pressed together, fingers intertwined, until Shaw's phone rings and Root flicks her implant back on.

            It's Harold, relaying a message from the Machine. And the Machine, probably complaining that Root wasn't available when she called, Shaw thinks. That is, if the machine can complain. Speaking of which, once she hangs up on Harold and begins to go about the motions of the morning, she turns towards Root.

            "When'd you turn it off?" She asks, unable to contain her curiosity.

            "When She told me you were outside, yesterday." Root replies, absent-minded as the Machine no doubt feeds her information once again.

            Sam pretends this information doesn't make her heart flutter, just a little bit, but from the smile in Root's eyes they next time they look at each other she's probably not fooling either of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The phrase "opportunistic bisexual" is how one of my dear friends self-ids: I've borrowed it here because when we were introduced to Zoe Morgan that's all that ran through my head :D


	10. Work Song

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this may be a bit distressing and it ends in a cliffhanger (sorry not sorry) but, spoiler alert, I promise everything will be okay. 
> 
> song by Hozier

_No grave can hold my body down_

            Things return to....normal? very quickly after that. The task the Machine set for them this time is one of those epic, multi-week ventures that leaves them constantly in harms' way and getting very little sleep. When they do sleep, though, it's together--or, on occasion, in shifts. And Root sews her up when she gets a graze wound, Shaw steals ice from a convenience store when Root sprains her ankle, and in their own weird way (in their own weird world) everything is good and exactly what Shaw hoped it would be.

            The boys know they're together, this time. Like Root wanted. And though to call her _reserved_ would be a gross understatement Shaw is learning to lean into the kisses Root sometimes plants on her cheek as they plan things out in the library. Learned not to shy away from Root's hand on the small of her back or brushing through her hair.

            Anyway, the point is, Shaw should have known there would be a catch somewhere. And apparently, Root's sad eyes kissing her softly and whispering "Sorry Sameen" in her ear before leaving her covered and sprinting into fucking _machine gun fire_ is the catch.

            _What the fuck, Root?_ She thinks as she looks around for her gun, finds Root has managed to nick it along with all of her ammo. She's got to improvise. She does a quick inventory and finds Root has left her with her throwing knives--she wouldn't ditch her unarmed, Shaw figures--and there's a dusty roll of duct tape next to her, probably left behind by whomever was loading up the shipping container that is now essentially cannon fodder and also, Shaw's body armor.

            Nowhere like a loading dock for a good shoot-out, but she's worked with less.

            "ROOT, YOU ASSHOLE" she yells at the top of her lungs as she edges towards the end of the container, "YOU DON'T GET TO BE SELF-SACRIFICING"

            "THE HELL I DON'T" Root replies, loudly but without strain and without a beat, doing a backflip over what, to Shaw's eyes, looks like nothing until it materializes on the container behind her as a spray of bullets. Shaw knows good and well that, Machine or not, Root can't dodge this kind of fire forever. Machine guns aren't really about precise aim, and as such, aren't really so easy to avoid in the eerie, graceful way Root usually does. There's blood on the ground already and while Shaw knows it isn't all Root's she can tell from how it's trailing that some of it is. _This_ , she thinks bitterly, _is why you don't try to stop a military coup. They have the big guns_.

            Still, her girl needs her so there's no time to dawdle. She slips around the container, takes aim with one of her knives, and lodges it straight in the barrel of the tank that was approaching on Root. There's a moment's pause before the round within it gets stuck and the entire damn thing groans, metal bursting and buckling outward from the jammed barrel, shrapnel splicing up all those within.

            The fight is on.

            Until, that is, she's lining up to throw yet another knife (at someone's eye, this time, and yes, that would hurt) and doesn't notice the last remaining machine gun train its sights on her instead of chasing after Root. Doesn't notice Root jump to cover her until it's too late.

            And Root's already taken three in the stomach.

_I'll crawl home to her_

            She finishes off the remaining gunners quickly after that. Disabling their weapons, or maiming them, or straight-up killing them--she isn't really paying attention to details at this point, and she has her gun back from Root so she's doing this the easy, automatic way.

            When everything is finally silent the stench of iron is strong in the air and underlined with shit and vomit and urine and dust and all the other vile scents of battle. She runs back to Root, her own breath loud and thread-y in her ears, strips off her hoodie to apply pressure to the deep red wound beneath her lover's pale hands.

            "Root," she gasps, "Root look at me." And Root does and smiles a bit but her eyes are even more unfocused than usual, and it looks like at some point a bullet clipped the hardware of her implant where it's glued to her skull. There's so much blood. Shaw knows from personal experience that even minor head wounds bleed a lot but between the sticky blood beneath her fingers and the red-streaked metal sticking to Root's long hair, she's terrified.

            She can't remember the last time that she was this scared.

 

_She gives me toothaches just by kissing me_

            It figures though, that it'd be Root causing this fear. Root is terrifying and a force to be reckoned with and she just took out at least fifty people and no small amount of heavy machinery with three handguns and more physical coordination than the love child of a gymnast and a ballerina. Oh, Root's scary all right. But Shaw has never been afraid of her physicality, not even that first time they met. Intrigued. In awe. More than a little turned on. But never afraid.

            It's funny, in a way, that Root brought her fear not through her violence or power or mighty intelligence, but by kissing her forehead before she goes to sleep. By curling up against her in the morning. By that hand on the small of her back in the library. By learning how to make her favorite dishes. By dancing with her, alone in their apartment (and it really is theirs now: Shaw has a key and all her clothes there and everything). By fucking her raw and senseless and then whispering "I love you" in an endless litany while they put her back together again.

            She thinks of those moments and of Root smiling and of the emptiness she felt the last time Root left.

            And she feels more vulnerable and terrified than she ever has before.

_She never asked me once about the wrong I did_

            She loves Root in part because Root never judges her. They'd all made questionable choices but despite this commonality she knows Harold tries to understand how she could have left her family the way she did without quite succeeding. Knows Reese has gotten so soft as to question her methods and modify his own. Even Zoe's asked, one evening when they were truly shitfaced drunk, how many people Shaw's killed. But not Root.

            Root never judged, never blamed.

            Root took her as she is, not as she used to be. Not as she might be someday. Just as herself, in each moment they were together.

            Shaw's not sure she's ever known acceptance the likes of which Root has granted her, even when it's hard for her to do so. Even with the parts of her--the reluctance, the infrequency with which she tells Root she loves her--that aren't what Root would maybe wish for.

            Shaw's not sure she can live without that.

 

_When my time comes around, lay me gently in the cold dark earth_

            There are sirens in the distance and tears running down her face. Root is trying to talk, to tell her something, but her mouth is full of blood that Shaw worries is coming from her lungs. Shaw's forehead is pressed against hers.

            "I love you I love you I love you", she repeats over and over again, feeling Root's warm blood seep through their makeshift bandage and over her fingers. "Please Root I love I love you I love..." And Root closes her eyes with a soft smile as the medics pull her away.

            And everything goes black.


	11. Love Me Dead

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :D thanks for sticking with me through that last one, folks. I would be a dishonest author if I said your pain, as expressed in the comments, wasn't both satisfying and flattering. If it makes you feel any better I did put a rush on posting this one just for all y'all. And okay, for me too.  
> This is probs the longest chapter in the entire damn work and it runs the angst/fluff/smut gauntlet so please pretty please, continue to let me know how you're feeling.  
> I've got an epilogue-of-sorts planned but not written, so you're going to have to wait a little longer on that, but hey! No cliff hangers this time :)  
> Song for this chapter is Ludo's Love Me Dead, aka when I started re-dating my ex last year i fell in love with this song (and I mean, her too, but sticking to the relevant facts) and have not stopped humming it since. Enjoy.  
> (the ASCII is hyper-linked to footnotes, and also tbh not remotely meaningful)

_Love me cancerously_

            The next thing Shaw knows she's coming to in a hospital, the smell of antiseptic sweet and sharp and unmistakable. The walls are white and she's in a cot under a thin blanket, saline and antibiotic drip in her arm. She's still covered in blood, but she's wearing one of those awful backless gowns now, and a plastic ID bracelet, and her head is throbbing something horrible. She finally opens her eyes to find Harold, sitting perfectly still next to her bed with Bear in his service dog vest curled at his feat

            "Harold," her voice is hoarse, her throat feels like it has road burn, "Harold,"

            "You're all right," He's quick to reassure her, in that vaguely nervous way of his. "You've just got a concussion, that's all. And some particularly bad scratches the doctors were worried might get infected, but the antibiotic is mostly just a precaution. You'll be fine." As he says this he raises her bed up, pours her a glass of water that does little, honestly, to ease the pain in throat.

            "Root," She manages after a few sips, "Where's Root?". Harold's eyes look sad, and he reaches a hand out to rest on her arm before answering.

            "She's just gotten out of surgery. It....it was touch-and-go there, for a while, but she's through the worst of it. And she's strong."

            "I need to see her." Shaw tries to sit up but a wave of dizziness washes over her like a tsunami and she doesn't quite manage it.

            "Reese is with her now, why don't we go see her in the morning?" Harold's voice is gentle and overly reasonable and she hates him for it, a little bit, "He'll call if there's any change," Harold continues, "And we're just down the hall. She's stable, Shaw, she'll be okay." Shaw wants to argue, of course, but while she could almost certainly take Harold dizzy and in pain and weaponless, she's too tired to try.

            "She's asleep?" She finally asks.

            "Yes," Harold confirms, voice still far too _kind_ for Shaw's liking.

            "Take me to see her right when she wakes up." She finally acquiesces, sinking further into her pillows. "You promise?"

            "I promise" She thinks she sees a hint of a smile on Harold's face before she drifts back to sleep.

            Of course, she has a concussion, so "sleep" is a relative term, with nurses waking her every two hours and shining lights in her eyes and all that bullshit. Shaw's feeling undeniably cranky by the time her doctor comes around in the morning, but before she can even launch into her well-prepared rant about how surely all this is unnecessary by this point he finishes reading her chart and hands her a pen and her release paperwork. Thank fuck.

            A nurse helps her shower (and isn't that embarrassing? But she needs to scrub the dried blood off her skin and out of her hair and if she has to sit on a bench to do so, so be it) and the hospital gives her a pair of scrubs, since her clothes have surely been destroyed by now, so she's feeling a touch more human as Harold pushes her in a wheelchair (how ironic, she thinks) down the hall to Root.

            Root's still asleep as she enters the room and takes her hand. She's looking pale. Well, Root always looks pale, especially against Shaw's golden skin, but she's looking extra-pale and gaunt at the moment, though surely it's only been a day and a half at most since the last time Shaw saw her. She slowly stirs awake, yawning and beginning to stretch before Shaw frantically stops her.

            "No no no," she whispers, everything around them feeling so subdued she doesn't think she could speak at a normal volume if she tried, "you'll rip your stitches"

            "Mmmm," Root blinks in response, "Thank you sweetheart" Her voice is also raw, but here she is, she's speaking and breathing and _alive_ and despite her best efforts tears prick at her eyelids.

            "I was so worried I was going to lose you. That you were going to die." She doesn't even care that Harold and Reese are still in the room, Harold leaning against his boyfriend's (yes boys, she has noticed) shoulder.

            "Don't worry" And Root sounds a bit bleary, probably the pain meds they've got her on, "The only thing I'm dying of is you."

            And that doesn't make much sense.

            But all Shaw can think is, _ain't that the truth?_

 

_Kill me romantically_

            The recovery process for Root is arduous. They knew it would be, and in fairness it could have been a lot worse. Fortunately (and seriously Shaw has never been as grateful for human biology as she is now), much of your small intestine is somewhat expendable and it's common knowledge that the liver regenerates so....

            So it's a long time before Root's eating solid foods again, pretty much, and that means it's a long time in the hospital. Shaw used to love hospitals, because being in one meant doing something she excelled at. She doesn't, any more, because now they mean post-op exercises and Root pushing away the nurses, demanding that only Shaw can redress her wounds or wash her hair in the low sink down the hallway.

            Eventually, and when no one else is around, Shaw asks her why this is. She leans in to whisper in Root's good ear, the implant hardware replaced but not yet turned on ("Not until you're out of the hospital," Harold had said firmly. Shaw wondered who he had to bribe or blackmail to insure what, to an outsider, must be such a strange request).

            Root smiles at her indulgently, "Only you are allowed to hurt me, silly." She replies as though it's so obvious it doesn't even warrant mentioning.

            "Funny," Shaw replies drily, "Usually you're the one hurting me." It's a joke and Root's eyes light up in recognition as she plays along anyway.

            "Yep," She nibbles on her own bottom lip, playfully running a fingertip up Shaw's arm to tap at her chest, "Just the way you like it."

            And Shaw really can't argue with that.

_You're awful, I love you_

            If their time in the hospital felt long, the time Root's on bed rest must surely be an eternity.

            As when Shaw's knee was healing, lo these many months ago, they play a lot of video games. And board games. And fuck it, Shaw is just trying her best to avoid the games Root makes up, because those are just disastrous. Seriously, if Root wanted her to _color_ , or _meditate_ , or _reflect on her feelings_ she'd quickly volunteer if it meant avoiding....

            "Root, you're upside down."

            "073 039 109 032 110 111 116 032 115 116 097 110 100 105 110 103 032 117 112 032 117 110 116 105 108 032 121 111 117 032 102 105 110 100 032 066 101 097 114[1]"

            "....Is that ASCII?" Apparently, you CAN shrug while doing a handstand _and recovering from a severe abdominal wound, for fuck's sake._ "Honey," Shaw tries to deliver the endearment with her usual brand of taunting irony, but it just comes out exhausted, "We've talked about this. I'll only go on your treasure hunts if you're not in a position you could hurt yourself in."

            "073 032 100 105 100 110 039 116 032 101 118 101 110 032 099 111 110 118 101 114 116 032 105 116 032 097 108 108 032 116 104 101 032 119 097 121 032 116 111 032 098 105 110 097 114 121 033[2]"

            Great. Now her girlfriend is pouting. That's just....wonderful.

            Seriously, Shaw knew she was a masochist--in the literal, physical sense of the word--but dating the single most annoying person on the planet is taking that to a whole new level.

           

_She knows just how to hold me, and when her edges soften, her body is my coffin_

            Handstands notwithstanding, with Root's injuries it's of course a long time before they can have sex again. This doesn't sit entirely easily with Shaw--some part of her is still wrapped up in the habit of thinking that her relationships are _just to scratch an itch_ and while she knows, by now, that what she's doing with Root, what they are, is deeply and intrinsically _not that_ it's still an adjustment, some days. An oddity to lie down in bed with Root at night fully clothed, to snuggle chastely, to kiss her full on the lips knowing they aren't going anywhere with it. So it's pushing her emotional boundaries, you could say. Nudging at her carefully constructed idea of herself--an idea that she knows is deeply inaccurate but through sheer habit or nostalgia or some other mysterious factor is difficult to let go of.

            Of course, this isn't the only reason it's a challenge.

            It's also a challenge because there are a lot of ways for Root to dom her without lifting a finger, and Root has been having _so much fun_ appearing completely unaffected as she orders Sam onto her knees, tells her just how to touch herself, just when and how many fingers she can press inside. She likes giving Shaw ice cubes, too, make her hold them just above her nipples, her clit until the frigid water drips onto her sensitive body, stinging in shock and ferocity.

            Root can make her hiss without so much as running a fingernail down her back. Root can make her beg with only her words, can make her come on command.

            And while all this is _nice_ , no doubt, it's doing little to quench how much Shaw wants to feel her skin again. Wants to lay beneath Root and feel the warm solid weight of her body, wants to completely lose track of all the places she ends and Root begins.

            (She wants to kiss the scars on Root's belly once they've healed, wants to remind herself that for all they've been through Root is still _real_ and _alive_ and _here with her_. That the bullets didn't take her away)

            God, even when she's horny Root's made her into such a sap.

           

_She wears me down to bones in bed_

            Root has a post-op check up, and while Shaw's usually involved in those Root's been off bed rest for a bit and Shaw's helping out the boys again--their hands were getting overly full with both Shaw and Root out for the count--so Root goes on her own. When Shaw comes home she fully expects a rant from her girlfriend about the poking and prodding doctor's appointments necessarily entail.

            Instead the evening light is filtering through the blinds and casting their apartment in a warm glow that can only be achieved with the fluorescent lights _off_ , and Root's sitting on the edge of their bed in _fucking garters_ and Shaw's glad she's not an Austen protagonist because she's close enough to swooning as is.

            "Come here," Root commands unnecessarily. Like Shaw's going to stay frozen in the doorway with her girlfriend looking like that.

            "Did the doctor...." Shaw starts to ask as she approaches Root but her question cuts off in a gasp as Root draws her into the circle of her arms, tilting her head back to tease Shaw's sensitive neck with the promise of her teeth.

            "You may touch me, yes." Root confirms, and that's it: Shaw's running her hands across Root's back, across her body, she's here and real and warm and soft and Shaw can't believe she gets to feel her this way again, gets to taste the salt of her skin as she kisses up her neck to her mouth, where Root wastes no time in capturing her bottom lip between her teeth.

            Shaw's not quite sure how they get her undressed but they do, and god she loves being with her girl like this, loves feeling their legs intertwined and loves that when she accidentally brushes her hand against the scar on Root's abdomen as she moves down her body to undo the garters Root tells her to _do that again_ before the half-formed apology in her mind can make it past her lips. So she gently kisses the newly healed skin, and Root winds her fingers in her hair.

            "It's so sensitive" She tells Shaw

            "But it doesn't hurt?" Shaw asks in response.

            "Not really. Just like pressing a bruise a little," Root gasps before adding, "Good."

            "Good," Shaw responds, continuing down Root's body to unclip her garters and roll her stockings down the long length of her legs before carefully removing her underwear, and then there they are: naked in front of each other. And Shaw knows that this is not Root's first scar and that between the two of them their bodies are marked up in all sorts of ways and it's no big deal really, except Shaw can't quite get over what it symbolizes. Can't get over the two of them getting a tomorrow and getting to do this again and, "I love you." She whispers, pressing another kiss to Root's scar. "I love you so much."

            "Come here," Root's hands guide Shaw up the bed until their foreheads are pressed together and Shaw's thigh is between Root's and they're kissing again, heady and a little frantic. "I love you too, Sameen" Root murmurs against her ear as she flips them over, grinding down on Shaw's thigh, which she is all too happy to bring up to meet Root's thrusts.

            God, her girl is beautiful, riding her thigh like this, all pressure and heat and slick, her eyes pressing closed in concentration. Their hands are still wondering each other's bodies, eager to relearn the curves and divots and textures of each other.

            "Sam," She gasps out as Shaw rolls her nipples between her fingertips. "I want you to fuck me." and god, this woman takes her breath away, and Sam's nodding _yes_ and probably saying "yes" aloud too but who even knows at this point, she's so turned on her body is thrumming with it and everything is hypersensitive. As she slides first one finger and then two smoothly into Root and Root grinds and gasps and flutters against her, her own cunt clenches in response and they're both moaning. The angle isn't quite perfect with the solid weight of Root still on top her, hands on her shoulders, hips circling as Shaw's fingers scissor inside of her, but Root slips a leg in between Shaw's and the friction isn't quite enough but Shaw's desperate, she'll take anything, and it's so good.

 

_You suck so passionately_

            Later, after Root has come on Shaw's fingers and again sitting on her face, after Root unsuccessfully kisses the slick off Shaw's lips and whispers "I love the way I taste on you" in her ear, she bites and sucks beautiful bruises down Shaw's neck. God, her neck's going to be _purple_ in the morning and she can't wait, it's the perfect amount of hurt to set her body wholly on fire as she begs Root, please, please to suck her clit she wants to feel her mouth again and her tongue pressing into her please

            And Root smiles, looking more than half-feral and fully beautiful, as she moves down Shaw's body.

            "I suppose," she says, cocking her head to one side in a mockery of consideration, "that you have been an awfully good girl for me, haven't you?"

            "Yes---" Shaw begins to affirm but cannot continue to do so as Root circles her clit with her tongue, sucking at her harshly and with just the edge of teeth that Shaw likes until she's coming, god Root just started _touching_ her and she's coming and Root keeps licking and sucking until one orgasm spills over into the next and Shaw's shouting as Root presses a finger into her.

 

_You're a parasitic pyscho filthy creature fingerbanging my heart_

            When she's settled down a bit Root's got two fingers inside of her and resting her head on her stomach.

            "Do you think, Sameen," she asks carefully, "That you could take my whole hand?"

            "Please Root. Please." and Root works her fingers into her slowly, adding some lube from the nightstand beside them and it's shocking cold against Shaw's overheated labia and the sensation has her gasping in pleasure as Root presses a fourth finger in, and then her thumb, and she can't quite form a fist but even this stretch is so good Shaw can't think of anything else, can't see anything but the way Root's eyes are wide in self-satisfied delight as she fucks her with her entire hand, and it burns something fierce and beautiful and when she comes again she nearly passes out, and she trembles uncontrollably with aftershocks as Root eases out her fingers and wipes them both clean and pulls Shaw into her chest and holds her, kissing her forehead and telling her how good she is for her, and how beautiful, and how she loves her so unbearably much.

            And once her body is calm and warm again Shaw starts crying, because she's never been in love like this before and it's overwhelming, how much Root feels like home.

            And Root, bless her heart, Root, who kills without a second glance or thought, who is terrifying and lethal--

            Root holds her close, and reminds her that she's not going anywhere, that she's got Sam and it's okay, she's right here.

            Eventually, they drift off to sleep like that, still nestled together as the sun settles in the sky and the apartment dims with the dusk.

 

_She moves through moonbeams slowly_

It's probably an hour or so later when Shaw wakes up again, hungry--they never did have dinner--and Root's already up out of bed, dancing softly around the apartment. The moon is full and coming through their window in silver stripes, and when Root sees her watching she laughs, and comes back to kiss her.

            Shaw is in awe of her beauty. It's captivating.

            She thinks she could watch her laugh in the moonlight forever without looking away.

 

_I know she drains me slowly_

            And Shaw knows: Root is still demanding, and occasionally a flat-out whiner, and she's going to make awful innuendos and do gymnastics around their apartment and Shaw's going to be annoyed.

 

_Must be the sign on my head that says, oh, love me dead_

            But that doesn't really matter.

            Because she can't imagine Root without the little ways she infuriates her, sometimes, and she doesn't want to imagine her life without Root ever again.

            So she rolls her eyes, still, but stops suppressing her fond smile.

_You've got the mark of the beast_

            They still aren't good people. Shaw doesn't know if they'll ever be, if either of them even want to be. Hell, Shaw doesn't know for sure that _good people_ exist these days, but maybe the world is better that way.

 

_Love me dead_

            And in any case, as good and bad and ambiguous as they are:

            They get this good thing, in each other. In waking up together and eating breakfast, in enduring Harold's knowing looks and Reese's smirk when they both go in to the library the next day.

            In going home together.

            And waking up tomorrow to do it all again. 

[1] I'm not standing up until you find Bear

[2] I didn't even convert it all the way to binary!


End file.
